I am about to flush the radiator in my Ram 2500 with Cummins engine. The bottle cap says "use only special coolant". What could be so special about this coolant; afterall, it's a cast iron block and head engine. GM now has a lawsuit against their "Special" coolant; experts claim it ruined their engines. Any thought?
Not sure about the Cummins but I just wanted to say that my elderly parents just had to spend $3600 to put a new engine in their Oldsmobile. Mechanic said the Dexcool had ruined the engine. Gigantic Mistake (GM) won't cover a penny of it. Said it's not their problem. I would be really interested in any class action lawsuit against GM.
It was not really the dexicools fault per say, it is GM's. The problem lies in the increasing presence of aluminun with the cart iron in the engine assembly which increase reactivety with water in coolant. A 50/50 mixture will not cut it and GM came up with Dexi to try to stay with
50/50 to save money on coolant on production line. I have a few vehicles that have had dexi in them for over 5 years now and they are all fine and coolant and overflow tanks are a clean as day one but they are also running 60 to 70 percent dexi too. Even Mazada recognized the problem when they came out with the rotary engine long ago and called for a
90/10 mex (anitfreeze to water) in their early rotary engines that had a lot of aluminum in them.
Actually, there is a class action lawsuit pending against GM for Dex-cool, Alleging severe engine problems. Do a google search on the issue and you'll find lots of info on it. But of course, the lawyers will get the bulk of the settlement millions, and each consumer will probably just get a replacement bottle of antifreeze. Hope this helps.
Cummins engines with removable liners tend to suffer from cavitation corrosion, these engines require a special coolant additive but the 5.9L doesn't have removable liners and doesn't seem to suffer that problem so any good quality antifreeze should work.
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